Stuck in the Sauce!

Edition #250

Good morning!

Watching the Patriots get blown away by the Bears on Monday Night Football was enjoyable, but it’s up to the Jets to keep them down.

The Patriots have won 12 straight games against the Jets dating back to the last New York victory in December 2015. The 2022 Jets are all about breaking disappointing trends, this weekend will give us a chance to break another.

We’ll have more preview material tomorrow on that game, but today I just wanted to spend a little time talking some Sauce.

On the injury front, Corey Davis and JFM were both missing from practice yesterday, Corey with his knee and JFM with an illness. James Robinson did practice and Saleh confirmed that Jermaine Johnson has a chance to play this weekend.

Although James Robinson is practicing with the team, Saleh wouldn’t commit to him playing on Sunday. He did say that he was the perfect complement to Carter and Johnson because of his one-cut-and-go mentality.

When asked about his taking receipts comment, Saleh seemed a little coy stating he just wants it to go away as it was an out-of-character moment. I didn’t love that comment in the midst of losing but he’s been proven right. National broadcasters have been all over it, but I’m at a point where I also just want it to go away.

When asked about Elijah Moore, Saleh commented: "He's good. We're all good. We'll see if we can get him the ball and make a few plays." - It’s going to be really interesting to see how this one plays out. He elaborated saying “He's been fine. Is there frustration? There probably still is. But he's not quitting on anybody. He's not dogging it ... he just wants to contribute." - When he was pushed and asked if Moore still wanted to be traded Saleh said he didn’t know as he hadn’t asked.

In the run-up to the 2022 NFL draft, I spent so little time talking about Sauce Gardner because I just didn’t think the Jets would take a corner. He was my #1 rated corner by a distance and personally, I thought he was head and shoulders the superior player to Derek Stingley Jr, who I was very anti-drafting.

As soon as Sauce stepped on the field I think we all felt he could be special, we just didn’t know when. I’m not sure even the most optimistic fan expected Gardner to dominate in the manner he has. Not only does his athletic ability shine on a week-to-week basis but his football intelligence and reading of the game have been obvious from the start. Like DJ Reed said recently, you wouldn’t know he was a rookie.

So now we’re 7 weeks into the season and we have a good sample size to work with, just how good has Sauce been? Well, let’s take a look at the statistics. In brackets, I’ve added his rank among rookie corners. Keep in mind that he’s played more coverage snaps than anyone.

Coverage Snaps: 278 (1st)
Targets: 40 (4th)
Receptions Allowed: 17 (2nd)
Completion % Allowed: 42.5% (1st)
Yards Allowed: 151 (1st)
Yards Allowed/Game: 21.6 (1st)
Yards After Catch Allowed: 50 (2nd)
YAC Allowed/Game: 7.1 (2nd)
Pass Break-ups: 10 (1st)
Interceptions: 1 (3rd)
NFL Passer Rating Allowed: 51.1 (3rd)
Penalties: 2 (3rd)
Touchdowns Allowed: 1 (Miscommunication) (2nd)
Pressures: 1 (3rd)
Tackles: 35 (2nd)

You don’t need me to tell you that those numbers are ridiculous for anyone, let alone a rookie. Of all the rookie cornerbacks in the NFL who have played at least 100 coverage snaps (14), only Sauce has more PBU’s than 4, so he has 6 more than the next-best rookie.

Comparing him only to rookies isn’t overly fair…to other rookies that is. If we compared him to all cornerbacks in the league with a minimum of 200 coverage snaps, of which there are 56, here is how he’d rank in some of the key metrics we look at:

Completion Percentage Allowed: 2nd
Yards Allowed: 4th
Yards After The Catch: 5th
Pass Break Ups: 1st
NFL Passer Rating: 5th

So when you look at his body of work among his peers, he is already a top-five cornerback in football, the film backs that up and so do the stats. To have three more pass breakups than any other corner in football for a rookie is absurd and it’s not as though he’s not getting tested. Of those 56 corners who have played at least 200 snaps so far this year, only 11 have been targeted more than Sauce.

The scary thing for the rest of the league is that he’s only getting better and better as the season progresses. Here are his numbers for the first three games of the year in comparison to the numbers for the last four.

There are still some out there who question the logic of taking a cornerback, which to me is illogical. The Jets have one of the most dominating defenses in football and certainly one of the most improved defenses, and that’s thanks in large part to the improvement in the secondary. Not just with Sauce, but he’s played a huge part. We can ask if Kayvon was the better value or if Ekwonu should have been the pick, but if you put them all up against each other, the Jets came out with the most impactful player.

Let’s just take a look at a few of his highlights so far this season. He’s obviously been beaten at points, but here are the highlights of what has been a dominant first 7 games in the NFL.

Week 1 vs Mark Andrews - 2 targets, 0 catches, 1 PBU
Week 3 vs JaMarr Chase - 1 target, 0 catches, 1 PBU
Week 4 vs George Pickens - 1 target, 0 catches, 1 PBU
Week 6 vs Allen Lazard - 3 targets, 0 catches, 2 PBU
Week 7 vs Courtland Sutton - 3 targets, 0 catches, 3 PBU

You could pick out 30-40 clips showing Sauce at his best but I’ve just got a couple of my favourites in here.

The first one is from the Green Bay game and it’s one of the PBU’s against Lazard. There’s something about this play that I just love. Sauce anticipates the crosser and his speed keeps him in the play and his active hands turn this from a first down to an incompletion

The next one comes from last weekends game in Denver, and this is a big play in a big moment. On 4th down Rypien is going for Sutton and if the Broncos score here then they either tie the game up or take the lead with a 2-point conversion. Sauce gets his head around early and gets his hands up at the perfect time, his timing is absolutely impeccable.

Here’s another from the Green Bay game because in future this play will be in every single coaching manual for cornerbacks. Romeo Doubs tries to put the double move on Gardner and Sauce doesn’t bite for a second, his backpedal, his plant, his drive, his hands…all of it is absolutely perfect. Doubs is a very impressive player and this move works on most corners in football, but not the elite.

Here’s one from the Bengals game and I believe this is a PBU on Tee Higgins. Again Sauce times his plant and drive perfectly, and we talk about angles with safeties but angles matter in football for every position. It also helps to have the kind of wingspan that Sauce possesses, that closes a perceived open window very quickly.

We all said that Chase was the first real test for Sauce and the Bengals receiver only got targeted once with Gardner shadowing him. Now we’re hearing that Stefan Diggs next week is going to be the real test. I wouldn’t put it past Sauce to largely shut Diggs down, when elite plays elite you win some and you lose some, but the battle is going to be an enjoyable watch.